Intangible assets are essential for business success. Maintaining a strong intangible asset portfolio (e.g., patents, trademarks, copyrights, trade secrets, good will, etc.) is critical to the successful growth of any business. Studies have estimated that close to 80% of organizational value lies in the organization's intellectual assets. In just our public companies this represents a value of over $50 trillion. Yet other studies show that:                Less than 2% of these assets are ever licensed        Although accounting regulations (FASB 141/142, IAS 36, 38, SEC SX, IFRS 3) require companies to identify, value and report these assets less than 6% of these are reported        Over 30% of all R&D is totally wasted re-inventing what has already been discovered before (often in the same organization)        An estimated $1 Trillion of intellectual assets are stolen or misappropriated every year        
This is the ‘Innovation Paradox’. Our largest asset class by far (intellectual assets) is the only asset class that has does not have an effective, comprehensive management system, have not spawned an ERP from solutions developed to manage the asset class and is by far the least liquid of the asset classes. This is due to two major factors (and numerous minor factors that we also address in this invention):                Most organizations have no inventory of their intellectual assets        Once they are able to inventory their intellectual assets most are then kept secret making collaboration (even within the organization and certainly between organizations) and commercial development difficult if not impossible        
The solution to this paradox lies in meeting several needs:                Organizations need a simple tool to facilitate their capture of their intellectual assets into a secure repository and then to effectively manage them over their life cycle        This process of capture needs to enable to recognition of ‘complex’ intellectual assets that are comprised of two or more intellectual assets as this is the way innovation has traditionally developed—through a series a continuous evolution and combination        Having built their secure repository organizations need to be able to manage access controls to these assets in such a way that they can address previously incompatible goals of protecting competitive advantage and effectively marketing these assets to potentially interested parties        Organizations need to be able to accurately and affordably value their intellectual assets distinct from other corporate value—and to track this value over time as it inevitably changes—this is not only sensible business practice but is also required under the new accounting rules        Organizations need to manage risk in the intellectual asset class—insurance is available for all other asset classes but has been largely unavailable for this asset class        There needs to be an infrastructure parallel to that that exists in the financial services industry for the clearing and settlement of these assets—this will enable the tools and liquidity of the financial services industry to apply to this enormously valuable asset class. Just as innovators need funds to develop their innovations investors are continually seeking new investment opportunities and new asset classes (particularly ones that do not correlate with other asset classes—an important consideration in risk management for asset managers)        
Recent changes in the accounting and tax laws emphasize how important intangible assets are to a company. These new laws impose an affirmative duty on the company to monitor and manage their intangible assets for the benefit of the shareholders.
To keep a strong intangible asset portfolio, businesses should continuously develop new intangible assets and evaluate those intangible assets lying dormant, with the primary goal of maximizing those assets for commercial benefit. Typically, companies build up their intangible asset portfolio by not only protecting their intangible assets, e.g., applying for patent, trademark and copyright protection, but also by licensing and cross-licensing the technology related to that intangible asset.
Despite widespread acceptance of intangible assets as critical to the future of a company's business and the changes to laws surrounding them, many businesses put intangible assets in the “too difficult box” in terms of managing and communicating their value. Many experts maintain that intangible assets are great importance at creating shareholder wealth, yet they remain under utilized part of many businesses. In fact, many businesses barely keep inventory of their intangible assets, much less aggressively try to maximize their value over their lifecycle.
Many CEOs, general or intellectual property counsels would love to have at their fingertips updated information about their company's intangible assets including currently developing or licensed intangible assets, problems that still need to be solved and/or intangible assets that are lying dormant. They would use this information in the company's business strategy to protect or improve current or future product or service positions and provide competitive advantage. All information adding further value to the company and potentially more profit.
Electronic laboratory notebooks have been utilized by some companies as first attempts to capture their inventions. These electronic notebooks allow the user to enter, search, store and report data. They also have the capabilities of having the notebook electronically witnessed. Electronic notebooks, however, fall short of providing a practical solution to managing intangible assets and maximizing their profitability.
Based on the critical role that intangible assets play in a company's business, there is a need for new systems and methods for managing intangible assets to maximize their value in the market place. There is also a need for systems and methods that provide updated intangible asset information and track and encourage innovation within the company.